painting door panels 2005 ES330

When you say "Lexus" I assume you mean a Lexus dealership, but if you want the car to be essentially perfect, then the paint should be blended into adjoining panels, otherwise, over time, the door may appear to be a different color from the adjacent panels.

Surely you most have plenty of 'scratch/chip/dent' specialists on that side of the pond? They are used extensively by dealerships here.

Fist off, we are talking far too many scratches to be properly "touched up" or polished out. It needs to be painted. In reply to Ray O; my referral to Lexus meant the body shop my dealer uses.

One shop who worked on my Honda and did a very nice job, told me they would paint both doors below the side molding for $300, Sounds like a shortcut to me. I'm looking for a compromise between the whole side of the car and the bottom of the doors. I'll do whatever I need to get a "perfect" cosmetic result.

The problem with painting just one panel or a section of the door just below the moulding it that it will probably fade at a different rate from the factory paint over time, so even though the match is perfect right after the repair work is done, it will gradually appear to be a different shade over time, especially if you have an adjacent panel to compare it with.

Blending the paint gradually over a larger area makes the difference in paint fade more difficult to detect over time.

So then it sounds like I would have to paint both doors in their entirety as well as blending in the front fender and rear quarter. My concern with the blend is that since the clear coat of the blend feathers out into a very this layer at its edge isn't it then possible that the blend may actually become visible as a line over time??

The body shop I go to (recommended by the Lexus dealer) guarantees their work for as long as I own the car.

In fact, on my 1997 ES300, the clear coat started pealing at about 4 years and they fixed it for free. Even paid for the rental car.

You might want to ask about that.

Generally, the blending or feathering is done around a foot or two past the area of the actual repair, with the color coat getting thinner the farther away from the center of the repair. If there is a seam or a gap nearby, it is usually included in the painted area because the seam or gap would make the difference in color noticeable. The new clear coat is painted and featherd over an even larger area so lines to not appear.

Body shops now have scanners to get very good paint matches, and so color differences would not be evident immediately after the job is done.

Thank you guys for your input. I have decided to go with the Lexus recommende dealer who will do the repair as it SHOULD be done. (pretty much how Ray O.explains). The shop also has a lifetime watrranty on the work.